This past Saturday, my best friend and I headed over to Universal City to watch the Backstreet Boys concert, This Is Us 2010 Tour. I wasn’t going to go, afterall, tickets were $125, but we ended up deciding that nosebleed seats at $30 weren’t too bad since it would be fun enough to reminisce. But holy toledo – what’s up with the high prices for the merchandise? No, thanks – I still have around 10 old school BSB shirts tucked away in a corner of my old room’s closet. What am I supposed to do with them and all the Burger King BSB toys I collected? My mom’s been telling me she’s going to throw everything away for years! Anyway, I digress.
The Backstreet Boys still got it. Argue with me all day but they can still sing, dance and make us feel like 13 year olds all over again. I still don’t understand why they can’t get any airplay but I have noticed, in my opinion at the least, that they seem to pick the worst songs on the record for their “single.”
They did a melody of old school songs, songs from Unbreakable and This Is Us. They have so many songs now, how should they ever pick the best ones? For a split second, we were all teased that they were going to break into “If You Want To Be A Good Girl (Get Yourself a Bad Boy)” – yeah, that’s the name of the song. I got a kick out of their solo videos portraying main characters in movies Fight Club (AJ), Fast & The Furious (Howie), Enchanted (Brian), The Matrix (Nick). Example: “The first rule of Backstreet Boys Fan Club is you do not talk about Backstreet Boys fan club.”
The only upsetting thing about the night (well, besides the 2nd to last row seats) was that the jumbotrons weren’t on and I could barely make out each of their faces!
It was all in good fun and I had a blast. I kept picturing each music video in my head (especially “We’ve Got It Goin’ On”) each time they played a song with a video, and I’m pretty sure I wasn’t the only one.
If anyone wants to start petitioning for a Backstreet Boys Greatest Hits Tour (I’d love to hear “As Long As You Love Me” in it’s entirety again!) – count me in!!
Oh yeah – the girl behind us was crying for the whole first song. I didn’t know people still did that. She was in her mid-20′s. Oh well, to each their own.
Check out my 10-minute-ish montage of This Is Us tour clips I captured throughout the night. Leave some love!
I headed out to catch Set Your Goals on their second night at Chain Reaction in Anaheim this weekend. Some how I failed to hear that Jordan had thrown up on stage the night before and was still in the hospital recovering. Fail.
The show was sold out, as predicted, and Chain was a hot sweaty mess, as predicted. What I did not predict was the madness and chaos that this night was about to witness. Random friends and various singers joined Matt to help him out on stage with Jordan’s absence. People were jumping on and off stage from all angles. From the pit, to the side stage, to the ledge. Kids were just grabbing the microphone and lending their vocals. The band was getting trampled on and I’m pretty sure they loved it. Oh and let’s not forget the 20-something people on stage! Let’s just say – it was a mess. I can’t even remember what songs they played because I was so distracted by everything going on! If I was in the pit and moshing it up, I’m pretty sure this would have been the show of my life or I would have been knocked unconscious since I did witness a couple people walk out with their heads bleeding. Either way, that’s not the way it happened and I’m a little sad. Last time I saw Set Your Goals was at the House of Blues when some stupid kid ran by us and spilled blood on Matt’s arm.
Soon, I shall be able to enjoy Set Your Goals’ set again. Warped Tour perhaps?
The best part of the night was that Chain doesn’t check anyone or anything therefore allowing me to bring in my nifty new Nikon D40. I was snapping away at a show for the first time ever. So stoked!
Check out the craziness that ensued Saturday night for yourself.
On May 4th, 2010 – Coheed and Cambria played the Pomona Fox Theater. I went out to the show and mind was BLOWN!
The band hit the stage at their exact set time of 10:10. Ten minutes before this, the crowd was getting antsy and started chanting out “COHEED! COHEED! COHEED!” When the band came out, the crowd was absolutely nuts. They started with “The Broken”. Fists and hands were in the air; people were head banging and crowd surfing. From the very first note to the very last encore song, the band and the crowd did not give up. I have never seen a show where the audience was completely engaged throughout the whole hour and a half set! Coheed kept the energy up even when breaking out the acoustic guitar for “Pearl of the Stars” (which is my personal favorite). Fans brought out their lighters and started swaying together. The band was AMAZING. The only other band that I’ve seen play longer than an hour was New Found Glory, but we all know they were already my favorite.
I have a lot of respect for Coheed and giving their fans their money’s worth. Times are tough for concert-goers (yours truly) and giving them almost 2 hours of live music – well, that my friends, is a respectable band.
Check out my favorite song live:
There was some sort of glitch in a system somewhere and I was sent a 2′x2′ Coheed and Cambria poster. It’s basically a big cardboard piece with the album cover printed on. But if you’re a huge fan, it’s a pretty cool piece to have.
My boss said I can give it away on here so here we go! Leave me a comment with your name, email, and tell me why you’re a Coheed fan. Dealine: Wednesday, 5/26. Get it done!
I was stoked for this show since it was announced. Even more stoked when I realized I didn’t have to drive out to LA and that it was hitting Pomona. The first time I heard about A Day To Remember was due to the cover of “Since You Been Gone,” and although I did enjoy it, I didn’t particularly like that I felt they were using the “let’s-cover-a-pop-song-and-become-famous” gimmick. However, once I was convinced to give them another try, I was blown away. The mix of hardcore and pop/punk was amazing and nothing I had heard that sounded so good.
Then comes May 2nd at Pomona’s Fox Theater. Stage walkways, smoke effects, giant screen, and lighting tricks? Who are you, the freakin Backstreet Boys? I wasn’t happy about all these effects. You’re a punk band – act like one please! I can’t be TOO mad because they put on an amazing show as always. Side note: the sound in the balcony of the Fox Theater blows, don’t sit there.
The place was sold out and kids were going crazy. Overall, it was an amazing show. But, lose the tricks boys, we just want the music.
The Downfall Of Us All
Shot In The Dark
The Danger in Starting a Fire
You Already Know What You Are
My Life For Hire
Cable Car (The Fray Cover)
Mr. Highway’s Thinking About the End
Welcome To My Family
Medley
You Should Have Killed Me When You Had The Chance
2012
Why Walk On Water When We’ve Got Boats
Monument
Homesick
Have Faith In Me
I’m Made of Wax, Larry, What Are You Made Of?
If It Means A Lot To You (Encore)
The Plot To Bomb The Panhandle (Encore)
Check out a clip of “Monument” live, the song that made me a fan.
Like I said in an earlier post, I’ve been a huge fan of This Providence since forever when I stumbled on a friend’s myspace page and “My Beautiful Rescue” played off of their music player (ya know, back when you could only have 1 song and people actually still used myspace haha). They have never gotten the recognition they deserve, not even from their label. I remember asking Dan about it when they played with Hey Monday and you could just tell he was frustrated in the fact that they had yet to do a headlining tour. But IT’S ABOUT DAMN TIME!
Holy Crap. I haven’t been to a show in a long time where I loved all the bands. This Providence, Set Your Goals AND Motion City Soundtrack?!
This Providence
Accents? Yes please! I love it! I have been a huge This Providence fan since way back in the day and I am very excited to see them finally getting some more recognition. Headlining tour?! YES!! From “My Beautiful Rescue” and “Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing” to “Sand In Your Shoes” and “That Girl’s A Trick” – i love all of it. Do yourself a favor and go check them out if you haven’t yet. They were amazing live as always.
Set Your Goals
If you don’t know Set Your Goals, then you’re really missing out. Whenever I listen to “This Will Be The Death of Us”, it truly inspires me to go out, be myself, and kick some ass! Stay young, stay true to yourself, and stick up for what you believe in are definite messages in SYG’ lyrics. I’ve heard some say that SYG is notoriously bad live, but I don’t know – they pretty much kicked ass last night. Maybe it was the crazy crowd and pit but I can’t wait to see them at Chain Reaction in May! While we were watching them, some kid runs out of the pit and spilled blood on Matt and we had to walk out to clean his arm in a panic and missed about three songs. Stupid kids – control yourselves!!
Last but not least…
Motion City Soundtrack
I love every song Motion City played last night. They came out to some crazy “walk the dinosaur” song and honestly, it continued for way too long. They opened the curtains, played the whole song, THEN walked out. They made up for it though. ”Worker Bee” sounded great live and listening to the audience sing every word of “Future Freaks Me Out” without Justin gave me chills. It must be amazing for the band to hear that. Justin told us how his day had been very “blue” but we “brightened his day” right before playing “Lifeless Ordinary”, which seemed to be perfect. They played for a good hour and it was such a great crowd. They sounded great and Justin’s voice was on point for the most part. Probably the best I’ve seen them do live.
Motion City is back! Can’t wait for some more shows from them. Check out their performance for “Even If It Kills Me” (one of my favorite songs) below.
Hated: 3OH!3, Ice T & Body Count, All American Rejects, Decadence All Stars, Blink 182
Now let me defend this list. The Aggrolites are just good and if you haven’t given them a chance, do s if you like the reggae-punk-sound (here). NOFX sounded great playing “Eat the Meek” and they were pretty hilarious during their interview. Katy Perry is an amazing singer and quite talented. She played “You’re So Gay” and although that’s one of my least favorites – she did it very well. Underoath was a big hit in our movie theatre and they did pretty well. Rise Against had to be THEE best performers that night! Hands down my favorite. They played their big hits “The Good Left Undone” and “Savior”. But honestly they sounded the best that night. Ozomatli was a very random band in the mix. Maybe because I don’t think many Warped fans know them but I do due to my cousin who loves them and got me into them. And Bad Religion really? They’re one of the reasons Warped Tour has been around for so long! They have been there since the beginning and are still around so it keeps all the older fans coming. They played “New Dark Ages” and “21st Century (Digital Boy)”. They reminded me that a big reason why I want to be in this business and love the music so much is because it keeps you young. Punk music reminds you when you’re older to let lose and remember when you were a crazy teenager once. These guys are getting pretty old but they’re still doing it and still loving it. I’ve seen Brett Gurewitz walking around in a “Farewell” band shirt. I wanna be that person =). Pennywise hardly played. They started off playing “Bro Hymn” and kind of just…went crazy. Chaos and insanity began as band members, staff, Kevin Lyman, and fans just got up on stage to sing. It was a pretty good ending to the Warped Tour birthday party.
However – the bands that I did not like. 3OH!3 – I already disliked them before this movie even started. I dislike them even more after being forced to watch them ‘perform’ “Starstruck”. They sounded horrible and those choreographed moves killed me. Ice T & Body Count? What the hell was this? Body count as a band sounded damn good but Ice T was just awkward. I thought he was going to blow up Club Nokia and start shooting up the place. I was scared. All American Rejects. Oh my god, what happened to Tyson Ritter? What was with all the glitter? What drugs is he on and why isn’t anyone stopping him. They sounded horrible. Intervention please! Decadence All Stars (Pete Wentz and members of Panic at the Disco) covered a Blink 182 song. That was pretty bad as well. Leave the Blink up to Blink thanks. I would love to say I loved Blink 182′s performance but guess what? They didn’t play a performance! The interview was pretty cool but I would’ve LOVED to seen a clip of their current tour not just their music video.
All in all – it was 50/50. I didn’t know what to really expect going into this movie theater. I was hoping for more interviews, more Warped tour clips and more of a documentary.
What I learned from this movie from all the band interviews is the Warped Tour is a rite of passage. Well, I already knew that. Every up and coming band dreams of going on Warped Tour not for the glamour of it all (because if that is the reason they’re insane). There is not much glamour to warped. You don’t shower, you’re riding a bus all day, you’re out in the hot sun or stormy weather, dragging your gear in 100 degree weather or mudslides but it IS all worth it. The bands said it best themselves, “it’s everybodys crowd, you gotta convince them you’re a legit band” (AAR), “Rite of passage” (Wentz), and “Traveling woodstock” (Mark and Tom).
I’ve had the privilege of meeting and conversing with Kevin Lyman and listen to him talk. This man is genuine and if he wasn’t doing it for the right reasons, there would not have been a 15th Anniversary.
We can all thank Kevin for putting together the highlight of our Summers.
Here’s a clip of Kevin on the Carson Daly Show speaking about Warped (source).
On September 12th, 2009 I took my boyfriend to see one of his favorite bands, Flogging Molly. I had heard some of their songs here and there wasn’t an active listener. Watching them perform live completely changed my mind and love them now! Saturday night they played all the favorites, “Drunken Lullabies”, “If I Ever Leave This World Alive” (my 2 new favorites!), “What’s Left of the Flag”, “Devil’s Dance Floor”, “Tobacco Island”, and more to a very drunken audience. I was slightly jealous I had no alcohol in me. There were young teenagers, moms and daughters, young and old couples all enjoying Flogging Molly. The Greek Theatre is an awesome outdoor venue in Los Angeles buried in a residential area but it’s great for a concert like this! They sounded amazing live and had great energy – I would definitely go out to see them again.
